In the third quarter, total equity investment in PE transactions increased to a record $40.1 billion, up from $36.4 billion in the second quarter and $17.8 billion in the first quarter, according to the Private Equity Growth Capital Council.

Liquidity is clearly improving in the venture capital market, making it easier for investors to cash out their investments.

During the third quarter, there were 111 venture-capital backed company exits, netting $6.4 billion. The number of exits rose by 11 percent while deal volume surged 70 percent compared to the same quarter a year ago, according to Dow Jones VentureSource.

Latin American direct investment—both greenfield and M&A—continues to rise as companies from around the world take a look at the opportunities that the region holds.

The region is not only doing very well from a macro-economic perspective, but it is also experiencing strong domestic growth, strong trade growth, and boasts an experienced corporate executive class who have led the region’s businesses through the crisis with relative ease.

GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) is taking on an M&A afficionado from Goldman Sachs to replace their retiring CFO, as they prep for the next wave of growth through acquisitions.

Simon Dingemans, head of Goldman Sach’s European mergers and acquisitions franchise, will take over the finance helm at the UK pharmaceuticals powerhouse—becoming CFO-designate in January and replacing retiring CFO Julian Heslop, who will end his term in March.

Few people would have cared—or understood—three weeks ago if someone had said that potash is a hot commodity. But with Australia’s BHP Billiton and Canada’s PotashCorp in a dukes up, all out brawl right now for control of the Canadian fertilizer firm, potash—and the fertilizer industry—have taken on new significance.

On Tuesday they took the battle to fresh heights—or depths as the case may be—when PotashCorp accused the Aussie mining firm of “highly-unethical” behaviour, as the FT reports.

HP and Dell on Friday continued their battle royale for 3Par, the data management and cloud computing firm. The deal is the latest in a long string of transactions this summer by big tech firms in their efforts to become even bigger—and move into territory now held by their competitors.

The battle has been raging since the start of last week, when Dell first put in an offer at $18 a share for all outstanding shares of the data storage firm. 3Par accepted. HP came in to the foray this past Monday—offering $24 a share. Dell sneaked in a bid at $24.30 Thursday morning this week, and HP came back that afternoon with a $27 offer.

There are a number of leveraged loan deals in the works this month, and more in the pipeline for September. Companies that are shopping for acquisitions, and a number of private equity houses with LBOs in the works, are turning to the leveraged market for funding, and the market looks set to continue growing as autumn approaches.

Bankers will soon market a $1.5 billion term loan for the buyout of New York nutritional supplements maker NBTY by The Carlyle Group. Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Barclays and Credit Suisse are the arrangers, and price talk is at 400 basis points over Libor.

Canadian fertilizer company PotashCorp has rejected a $38.49 billion bid from BHP Billiton, of Australia, to purchase the company. The fertilizer market worldwide has been a hotbed of M&A activity for the past few months and BHP Billiton’s bid for PotashCorp of Saskatchewan is just the latest in a line of deals that have been making the headlines.

On Tuesday PotashCorp said that its board had rejected the offer from BHP—saying that it undervalued the company. At $130 a share, the bid put a 16 percent premium on the company’s Monday closing share price. On news of the offer, the Canadian firm’s shares soared to $145.

A number of Latin American companies have been eyeing the US for acquisitions--with some big deals already completed and numerous companies looking to make use of their big balance sheets to buy US assets.

With restructuring and consolidation still the name of the game for many US firms, this could be positive news for US companies looking for buyers of their non-core assets.

Issuance of high-yield bonds continued to surge in April. And although companies are still largely using the proceeds to refinance existing debt, there are an increasing number of issuers using the money to fund mergers and acquisitions.

For example, Reynolds Group sold $1 billion of unsecured notes priced at 8.5 percent as well as a $750 million loan last week to finance its acquisition of Evergreen Packaging.